The March 1949 Syrian coup d'état was a bloodless coup d'état that took place on 30 March. It was the first military coup in modern Syrian history and overthrew the country's democratically elected government, after Syria gained independence in 1943. It was led by the Syrian Army chief of staff, Husni al-Za'im, who became president of Syria on 11 April 1949. Syrian President Shukri al-Quwatli, who was overthrown as a result of the coup, was accused of poor leadership and purchasing inferior arms for the Syrian Army. He was briefly imprisoned, but then released into exile in Egypt.
Many of the internal motivations behind the coup subsequently stemmed from dissatisfaction among the Syrian people and military because of al-Quwatli's leadership during the 1948 Arab-Israeli Conflict. Transnational corporate agendas in lieu of the commission of the Trans-Arabian Pipeline, such as that of ARAMCO and Saudi King Ibn Saud are speculated to have informed alleged US involvement in the coup. Among the officers who assisted al-Za'im's takeover were Sami al-Hinnawi and Adib al-Shishakli, both of whom in sequence would later also become military leaders of the country. Syria's legislature, then called the House of Representatives, was dissolved, and al-Za'im imprisoned many political leaders on the basis of various accusations.
Background
As recounted by the British military attaché in Syria, Husni al-Za'im began plotting a coup two years in advance in March 1947. On March 29, 1949, Za'im provided four of his senior officers with instructions outlining their roles in the coup; the officers were told to wait until midnight to view the instructions, and to do so in complete privacy. The coup commenced at 2:30 a.m. on March 30 and proved to be "a masterpiece of military planning, bloodless apart from the deaths of three bodyguards attached to a government minister." Quwatli, ill with "a gastric ulcer and heart complaint," was arrested in hospital by one of six military units that ferreted through Damascus and systematically captured key government buildings. The Syrian national anthem and a message from Za'im announcing the change in government began playing over the radio near dawn.
American involvement in the coup d'état
There are "highly controversial" allegations that the American legation in Syria, headed by James Hugh Keeley, Jr., and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) engineered the coup. Allegations and documentation of American involvement in the coup are underscored by the correspondence between Colonel Za'im and Western organizations such as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) preceding the coup. Formally an undercover Assistant Military attaché, undercover CIA operative Stephen J. Meade became intimately acquainted with Colonel Za'im several weeks prior to the coup. Meade was considered Za'im's "principal Western confidant" during Za'im's brief time in power, and alongside Miles Copeland Jr. (CIA Damascus Station Chief) had been described as playing a key role in orchestrating the coup. Available evidence, however, suggests that Za'im was in little need of prodding from the Americans. Per the British military attaché, Za'im had been contemplating a coup since March 1947, over a year before he was introduced to Meade on November 30, 1948.
Copeland later authored several books with "extraordinarily detailed accounts of CIA operations in, among other countries, Syria, Egypt, and Iran" that are considered "one of the most revelatory set of writings by a former U.S. intelligence officer ever published." However, Copeland's memoirs have a strong literary quality and contain many embellishments, which make it difficult to gauge the historical accuracy of the events that he describes. Moreover, Copeland's account of the Syrian coup in his 1989 autobiography The Game Player: Confessions of the CIA's Original Political Operative contradicts the earlier version presented in his 1969 The Game of Nations: The Amorality of Power Politics.
American intervention in Syrian politics had begun before the coup; in July 1947, as Copeland described attempting to eliminate "corruption and intimidation" in Syrian elections. Copeland also disclosed that many officials in Washington viewed Syria as a "pilot project" to determine the extent to which America could influence Middle Eastern governments and elections, as Syria was the first former colony in the Middle East to gain complete political independence from European colonial powers. In The Game of Nations, Copeland suggested that Syria, as the first former colony in the Arab world to achieve complete political independence from Europe, was perceived in Washington as a test case for America's "capacity for exerting a democratizing influence on Arab countries." According to Copeland, the CIA attempted to "police" the July 1947 Syrian national elections, which were marred by fraud, sectarianism, and interference by neighboring Iraq and Transjordan.
Geopolitical context and the Arab-Israeli Conflict
Quwatli's government and leadership perceivably jeopardized the stability of Syria, raising concerns among U.S. officials such as James Hugh Keeley Jr., a U.S. diplomat and envoy to the Syrian government, that Syria was "on the verge of complete collapse," which could have empowered the Syrian Communist Party or other "radicals" (such as the Ba'ath Party and the Muslim Brotherhood). Concerns were especially fueled by Syria's wartime performance and provocative conduct during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War under Quwatli's leadership. During the 1948 War, Quwatli's term has been described by scholars as a "disaster for both his presidency and democracy in Syria." The 1947 UN Resolution 181 that proposed a partition of Palestine into two states, often characterized as the catalyst for outrage in the Middle East over Western solidarity with Israel, had a profound effect on the fledging democracy that Syria was under Quwatli. After the UN declaration in 1947 that Palestine should be split into two parts, mass protests and civil unrest broke out across Syria, urging for Syrian intervention alongside the Arab League in Palestine. Syria is identified by some sources as being "the whip" that drove others in the Arab League to going to war with Israel, despite the speculation that Quwatli was fully aware of the inadequacy of Syria's military capabilities to contribute to a war effort as such. Under consideration of the outrage from his constituents, some argue that Quwatli had little choice in his perceivably overzealous directive to push for war in 1948.
Prior to the eventual Arab-Israeli Conflict, Syria and the US had rather friendly correspondence. Keeley even met with Quwatli to discuss Syria's role in current Middle Eastern geopolitics on 5 March 1949 (25 days before the coup). among which consisted of Quwatli obliging his determination to "resolutely to pursue a positive policy of collaboration with West." In this same conversation, Keeley disclosed that Quwalti acknowledged that, as Keeley described it in his memorandum, "as part of the price of effective western friendship, concessions must be made and settlement reached on Palestine issue." Copeland attributed the US perceivable benevolence to Syria as part of a larger agenda to ensure the elimination of any residual French control over Syria. Consistent with this notion, before the 1948 war, the US even agreed to provide the Syrian army with weapons and conduct training missions to "reshape" the infant Syrian army. The Syrian military at that time had been generally engineered by the French, and Quwatli believed that many soldiers in the army were originally recruited by the French and were subsequently untrustworthy. He viewed the training collaboration initiative with the US as a way to "purge" the military of officers with French ties. However, before either the US supplied Syria with arms or undertook the training mission with the Syrian military, Washington foresaw the possibility that weapons supplied to Syria may be used against Israel because of the rising tensions over Palestine leading up to the 1947 UN resolution. Quwatli was forced to resort to going to the Soviet Union to purchase arms, which were described to be of lower quality than those available from the US. Joshua Landis, Director for the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, said that Quwatli was blamed entirely by the Syrian people for the nation's subsequent loss in the war. This resulted in even more protests and civil demonstrations, notably stemming from other political parties. Quwatli responded by declaring martial law and sending the military to beat and subdue protestors. In this moment of chaos, Quwatli turned on Za'im and blamed him for the "loss of Palestine", which Landis characterized as making the army feel like a "scapegoat" and as if it was being "treated unfairly."
Owed to Quwatli's leadership and directives consistent with Arabism and unification of the Arab World after the 1948 Arab-Israeli Conflict, as well as the ensuing disarray that Syria was in after the war, Keeley became amenable to a military coup "as a way of safeguarding ... the long-term prospects of democracy in the country." At Keeley's behest, Meade carefully cultivated a friendship with Za'im ultimately being the one to suggest the idea of the coup to him. According to Copeland's retelling, Meade advised Za'im on not only how to lay the foundation for and prepare to successfully execute the coup, but also guided him through the necessary steps directly preceding the coup.
Available evidence, however, suggests that Za'im was in little need of prodding from the Americans. Many in Syria, Za'im included, viewed Syria and the Arab nations' loss in the 1948 conflict as something of a national tragedy and were furious over the country's inability to protect Palestine from the UN declaration. Copeland detailed that Za'im had been contemplating a coup since March 1947, over a year before he was introduced to Meade on 30 November 1948. Shortly before the coup, Za'im had tried to win Western sympathy by producing a list of individuals, including Keeley, that were supposedly "communist assassination targets," but American officials were skeptical. While Za'im directly informed Meade of the upcoming coup on March 3 and March 7, the Americans were not the only foreign power to be apprised since Za'im notified British officials around the same time. Keeley met with Quwatli on March 5 after Za'im was made aware of the coup's possibility. Regardless of Za'im's motivations and prior plans to carry out the coup, Copeland later admitted in a televised interview saying he was part of the team of US operatives that "organized and directed" the coup.
In his conversations with Meade, Za'im outlined his progressive political program for Syria (including land reform) as well as the communist threat and concluded that there was one "way to start the Syrian people along the road to progress and democracy: With the whip." Za'im struck a different tone in his conversations with the British by citing his desire to establish friendlier ties with Britain's major allies in the area: Iraq and Transjordan. In The Game Player, Copeland provided new details on the American assistance to Za'im's plan and expounded that Meade identified specific installations that had to be captured to ensure the coup's success. However, Copeland also acknowledged that Za'im had initiated the plot on his own: "It was Husni's show all the way."
Douglas Little notes that U.S. Assistant Secretary of State George C. McGhee visited Damascus in March, "ostensibly to discuss resettling Palestinian refugees but possibly to authorize U.S. support for Za'im." In contrast, Andrew Rathmell describes this hypothesis as "purely speculative."